The Adaptation Capability Framework identifies four capabilities that every public organisation will need to adapt to climate change, providing step by step tasks to guide your adaptation journey.

Public Sector Climate Adaptation Capability Framework Handbook

This handbook is an introduction to climate change adaptation for Scotland’s public sector. It provides an overview of the Climate Adaptation Capability Framework, which identifies four capabilities for a climate ready public sector. This booklet should be used alongside online Supporting Guidance which contains additional information about each task in the Framework.

New for 2025, the Handbook provides an overview of how the updated Public Sector Climate Adaptation Capability Framework can be used by any public sector organisation in Scotland to accelerate action on adaptation. It introduces the Framework, and outlines the four capabilities that an organisation will need to develop to progress adaptation.

Since publication of the first version of the Framework in 2019, more than 60 organisations have used the Framework to build their capabilities and benchmark their progress. We are proud that the Framework won the 2020 IEMA Sustainability Impact Award for Climate Resilience and Adaptation, and has gone on to inspire many similar adaptation capability approaches.

Adapting to climate change is not a standalone challenge – the actions that we take to adapt should deliver many benefits for society including addressing inequalities, supporting sustainable economic growth and nurturing a healthy natural environment. The Framework supports organisations to consider how adaptation support progress against wider societal outcomes and maximise co-benefits.

The public sector have a crucial leadership role to play in driving this response for a more climate resilient Scotland.

Gillian Martin MSP, Acting Cabinet Secretary for Net Zero and Energy

Starter Pack

Organisations getting started on adaptation may wish to start off by viewing the starter pack. The Starter Pack provides detailed guidance on the first stage tasks of the Framework. 

It is for professionals with limited prior knowledge of adaptation or for those working in organisations where adaptation work is in the very early stages.

It will also be useful for organisations that have progressed adaptation, to review and reflect on any steps they may need to revisit. Tasks and accompanying templates are provided to guide the initial adaptation actions needed to progress to the rest of the Adaptation Capability Framework.

An updated version of the Starter Pack will be published in March 2025, but the existing resource will still provide you with clear and actionable guidance on taking your first steps towards adaptation action in your organisation.

Benchmarking tool

New for 2025, the updated Public Sector Climate Adaptation Benchmarking Tool helps illustrate an organisation’s adaptation journey along the Public Sector Climate Adaptation Capability Framework. It should be used to provide a baseline assessment of your organisation’s current adaptation capabilities and how their development progresses over time. It highlights which capability areas the organisation is excelling at and others where more work may be needed. It can aid communication and engagement to show what your organisation is aiming for and the steps needed to get there.

The Benchmarking Tool aims to assess the adaptation progress of an organisation, not an individual employee, team or department. The tool, therefore, may need to be completed by a small group of colleagues initially, and then finalised through discussions with management and/or different departments.

This updated version of the tool aligns with the updated version of the Public Sector Climate Adaptation Capability Framework tasks, and also includes enhanced reporting features. It has also been optimised for screen readers, and has both red-amber-green and blue-scale colour options.

Skara Brae in the Heart of Neolithic Orkney World Heritage Site.

Historic Environment Scotland (HES) are tackling climate change and climate adaptation in several ways, from their internal operations to providing external support and guidance. This case study highlights some of the actions they are taking to protect the historic environment from the impacts of climate change, both now and into the future.

Building an evidence base to inform climate ready decision making for Scotland’s historic environment.

HES are responsible for the care and maintenance of 336 historic properties throughout Scotland. Many of these properties are situated in landscapes that are vulnerable to climate related natural hazards. Like much of Scotland’s historic environment, the properties often show an inherent resilience to Scotland’s wet climate, but climate change is creating new challenges that they were never designed to cope with.

In order to gain a more thorough understanding of natural hazard risk across the diverse and complex estate, HES worked in close partnership with the British Geological Survey and the Scottish Environment Protection Agency, to combine various natural hazard datasets into a Geographic Information System (GIS) database. This was then combined with spatial data from HES properties to assess the likelihood of various natural hazards occurring at those properties, see the case study here. A baseline assessment was produced that will allow a more informed approach to managing climate related risks to be taken.

The initial assessment allowed identifies 28 properties that are considered to be at very high risk from one or more of the natural hazards assessed. The next steps are to ground truth the initial desk based assessment update them with any in depth, site specific risks, before considering the landscapes beyond the boundaries of properties, the climate impacts on staff and visitor safety, site operations and internal collections, and to consider how UKCP18 data is incorporated.

‘Evaluating the climate change risks to the HES Estate has already improved our ability to prioritise and allocate resources more efficiently. A strategic evidence based approach to managing climate risk is helping us give our properties, and the wider historic environment, a fighting chance of weathering the challenges presented by climate change’

David Harkin, HES

New HES strategy – Our Past, Our Future

In June 2023, HES published a new strategy for the future of Scotland’s historic environment: Our Past, Our Future, which has at its heart the transition to net zero, resilient communities and places and a wellbeing economy.

The strategy, which builds on the previous strategy ‘Our Place in Time’, is intended to provide a roadmap for the next five years and highlights the sector’s shared ambition to make a responsible contribution to Scotland’s economy and use the historic environment to improve people’s wellbeing. It also has a strong focus on the transition to net zero alongside a forward-looking ambition to empower communities and build a wellbeing economy.

The strategy also sets out the goal of further retrofitting and putting Scotland’s traditional buildings back into use; estimates put these buildings at representing 19% of Scotland’s housing stock, 33% of retail space, and almost 50% of spaces used by the public sector.

Increasing skills for adapting and maintaining traditional buildings

In addition to assessing their own properties for exposure to natural and climatic hazards, Historic Environment Scotland is pioneering work to up-skill the public and professionals so Scotland is better able to adapt and maintain its traditional buildings from the impacts of climate change.

Changes in the climate, such as increased severe weather events, are already causing problems for many of Scotland’s traditional building and will continue to do so. However, these problems are also being made worse by poor maintenance. HES have been actively undertaking and enabling a range of activities and research to improve the quality and availability of skills and knowledge across the sector and beyond to future proof the historic environment, see the case study here.

See also the guidance document produced by HES, Edinburgh World Heritage and Edinburgh Adapts here:

Trialling new techniques to preserve historic structures

Many of Scotland’s iconic monuments survive as unroofed standing structures with open wallheads and exposed historic masonry. Increasing levels of rainfall and extreme weather events can lead to erosion of the historic fabric and loss of structural integrity through processes such as water penetration, increased freeze-thaw cycles and damaging plant colonisation.

HES have undertaken trials of ‘soft-capping’ techniques at a number of sites across the country, applying an impermeable clay layer beneath living vegetation on wallheads and roofs.

Carefully selected slow growing vegetation types are designed to reduce rainwater runoff and withstand extremes of weather, requiring minimal maintenance. The results are both visually acceptable and technically appropriate for protecting some of Scotland’s most vulnerable historic structures.

Protecting prehistoric remains

Severe coastal wind erosion has caused the collapse of the dune system which protected the Links of Noltland prehistoric settlement site on Westray, Orkney for thousands of years.

In response, HES initiated a programme of detailed assessment, survey, and targeted rescue excavations in 2006. This was followed by dune stabilisation works, including dune recharge, fitting biodegradable erosion resistant matting, planting and sand entrapment to protect the surviving archaeological remains for future generations.

Recent inspection confirms that these measures are working and that the area is being recolonised by vegetation. Many of Scotland’s most vulnerable archaeological sites and monuments are located on the coast and this project provides a model for the stabilisation of similar sites.

The building of the Queensferry Crossing provided an opportunity for Amey, who manage and maintain the crossing, to incorporate changes that will allow the bridge to be more resilient to severe weather conditions and a changing climate.

When Amey were appointed as operators of The Forth Road Bridge and Queensferry Crossing in 2015, they became the single company maintaining and managing the crossings of the Forth River. The construction of the new Queensferry Crossing was already underway at that time, however, Amey were able to bring in experience of other crossings, as well as learnings from recent closures on the Forth Road Bridge and put in place a number of systems to increase the capacity of both bridges to adapt to more severe weather conditions. These include signs to inform drivers of high wind speeds, changes to practices and guidance, new materials and innovative designs to the bridge itself.

Amey’s procedures over the years have moved from an approach where the roads must always remain open towards an approach that accepts, and communicates to the public, that travel will not always be possible during severe weather events. The construction of the new Queensferry Crossing has also provided an opportunity to incorporate changes that will allow the bridge to be more resilient to severe weather conditions and a changing climate, and therefore stay open when the Forth Road Bridge would have been closed.

These changes included using the latest and most durable materials, cables that can be replaced with more ease than on the Forth Road Bridge as it can be done as part of normal maintenance works without closing the bridge, a dehumidification system which reduces moisture and prevents corrosion, and thicker road surfacing which has a longer surface life and can be machine laid, making it easier to replace.

The biggest change incorporated into the new bridge was wind shielding which will make the crossing less susceptible to closure during high winds. Experience of other estuarial crossings, such as the Second Severn Crossing, shows that wind barriers provide a high degree of reliability against closure.

Public sector

The public sector has a crucial role to play in enabling Scotland to adapt to climate change. Taking a strong, proactive approach will ensure that vital public assets, infrastructure and services are fit for current and future generations and able to deliver positive outcomes across society.

Adaptation Capability Framework

The Climate Adaptation Capability Framework identifies four capabilities that every public sector organisation will need to adapt to climate change, providing step by step tasks to guide your adaptation journey.

Adaptation Capability Framework

Public Sector Climate Adaptation Network

The public sector has a crucial role to play in enabling Scotland to adapt to climate change. The Network is now comprised of over 60 public bodies who work together to benchmark their progress and identify and share learning on climate change adaptation.

PUBLIC SECTOR CLIMATE ADAPTATION NETWORK

Guidance to support long term adaptation and resilience of our coastal communities

Our changing coast

Coastal erosion and flooding (including erosion enhanced flooding) will affect society in many ways, impacting transport, power and water infrastructure, recreation, and businesses.

Over the last thirty years sea level across Scotland has risen between two and three times faster than over the previous 100 years. Scotland’s 21,000 km long and complex coastline is where much of our critical national infrastructure is located, with almost half the population living within 8km of the coast. Coastal erosion and flooding affects more of our erodible shore than in the past, with the rate of erosion expected to quicken under all climate change emissions scenarios. Sea level rise due to climate change will result in an almost doubling of the number of properties considered to be at coastal erosion and flood risk in Scotland by 2080s.

Aims of the Coast Change Adaptation Guidance

This guidance aims to support local authorities and their partners across Scotland in planning for our future climate at the coast, and to support long term adaptation and resilience of coastal communities.

This guidance has been produced to help local authorities begin their coastal adaptation journey. It encourages collaborative working across coast protection authorities, planning authorities, community planning partnerships, public sector environment and asset management teams, community members and other stakeholders.

This guidance has been developed by a steering group comprising Scottish Government, SEPA, local authorities, Dynamic Coast Project Team, NatureScot and Verture, throught the Adaptation Scotland programme.